What is the Harm in Cocoa Leaves!

At some point, with a little country like Bolivia claiming sovereignty over its own resources, against the global control of the UN’s Agenda 21, there was bound to be obstacles placed to prevent domestic sovereignty.

Bolivia has had a longstanding battle with the UN-US categorizing one of its natural resources as an illegal drug, a natural resource that the U.S. makes billions from annual from its fruit. The natural resource is the cocoa leaf, which under certain conditions has a narcotic effect.

After re-constitutionalizing the country under the Laws of Mother Earth, and the Law of Productive, former farmer and union leader, President Evo Morales has finally taken the decision to withdraw from the UN 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, a decision which has been presented to the international elite’s man in the UN, Ban Ki-moon…

The Cocoa Leaf (Erythroxylon coca)

Cocoa has been grown in Bolivia since pre-Columbian times. It is both sacred and medicinal. In its natural form, the cocoa leaf is not a narcotic, but with processing it becomes the raw material for cocaine. The original Coca Cola drink was based on the cocoa leaf, but now the cocoa leaf is only used as an essential flavouring. Traditionally it has been used to protect, to bless, and for medicinal purposes: digestive disorders, improve metabolism, and vertigo. There are no psychological effects because the alkaloids in natural cocoa leaves are digested slowly.

Chewing cocoa leaves in Bolivia is a common practice because with labour intensive work in the case of farmers, miners, and labourers, it acts as a stimulant to keep the chewer awake and alert. A cup of tea from the leaf is given to tourists in hotels as it helps to relieve altitude sickness, and science has confirmed its traditional application in the leaf’s ability to alleviate hunger, fatigue and sleepiness. Research at the Bolivian Institute of High Altitude Biology found that cocoa leaves had the ability to lower production of adrenaline and hence the greater need for oxygen.

Cocoa leaf contains 14 alkaloids, more vitamin A than fruit, and more calcium than milk. It is also rich in phosphorus, potassium, iron, vitamins B2 and E, carbohydrates, fibre, and proteins. The leaf has been found to be a tonic for the heart and the cardio-vascular system in general, and regulates sugar levels in cases of diabetes. Studies have found that chewing 100 grams of cocoa leaf is enough to satisfy the nutritional needs of an adult for 24 hours.

Only 0.08% of the cocoa leaf is in cocaine. Cocoa lead is sold legally in Bolivia, but cannot be exported without special permission. One such permission is given by the U.S. allowing for the exportation of cocoa leaf to U.S.-based company Stepan Chemicals, which extracts certain chemicals, and then sells it to Coca Cola as flavouring. As to what happens with the residue…!

In the 1990s the joint ‘Cocaine Project’ by WHO and UN Interregional Crime and Justice Research Found that the traditional consumption of coca leaves has no negative health effects and fulfills positive therapeutic, sacred and social functions for indigenous Andean populations. However, U.S. diplomatic pressure blocked the study’s publication.

The Ban

During the colonial adventures of the Catholic Churches’ Doctrine of Discovery, the Church saw the chewing of cocoa leaf as an obstacle that prevented them from “capturing the souls” of the indigenous, and decreed in 1569 the eradication of the plant. However, as the Spaniards advanced the Catholic colonial empire, and as Spaniards exploited the crop commercially, planting of the crop increased. The Spaniards distributed the leaf because they found slave labor improved with consumption of the leaf especially in the silver mines. So from condemnation to approval, King Philip II of Spain declared the cocoa leaf as being in the best welfare of the Andean natives, while the Catholic Church established a 10% tax on the crop!

The crop became a necessity of colonial exploitation out of which grew the land-owning class that dominates South American economies, including Brazil as a means of improving the productivity of the slave-labour force in mineral rich mines and on agricultural lands. A Decree of August 4, 1940 made the sale of cocoa leaf mandatory, as the miners would not work without it. The Catholic Church may have been right about not being able to capture their souls, as to the indigenous the chewing of the cocoa leaf became an act of defiance. The act of chewing provided group identity under exploitative conditions. It’s religio-cultural value is as protection against witchcraft, curses, and bad luck, and is used in ceremonies to give thanks for the blessings of Mother Earth (Pacha Mama).

As always, over-reaching itself, the machinations of a certain global medical consensus has on countless occasions nullified the virtue of a plant on the basis of limited/distorted perceptions, or lack of informed knowledge unless it was to their benefit. A clear example are GM crops, and biotechnology – throwing the baby out with the bath water, and only reclaiming the water!

Given the abuses of nature, and the international drugs trade, Bolivia should accept only domestic use, as what truly matters is the indigenous use of the leaf.

It was a 1950 UN report of the Commission of Enquiry of the Cocoa Leaf that led to the ban although the report itself stated:

“the observations of the commission show that coca-leaf chewing is not an addiction (toxicomania) but a habit.”

It was in 2008, that the International Narcotics Board prohibited the traditional use of cocoa leaf chewing. As far as Mamami, a cocoa farmer was concerned at the time; the INCB took this stance as an act of revenge against Morales, because he was a cocoa farmer. Considering the act of embargo of Cuba was because of the exploitative millions the Bush dynasty lost when Fidel Castro nationalized Cuban industries, the mentioned reason behind the cocoa leaf ban is highly probable. Morales responded in writing to the ban stating:

“Bolivia does not accept unilateral certifications or impositions from foreign governments.”

However, Bolivia was heavily tested by the production of cocoa leaf prior to the presidency of Morales, as it was essentially a cash crop that provided income for the poor. The illegal production of cocoa leaves, i.e. cocaine, took its toll on the environment, as the process requires lime, sodium carbonate, sulphuric .acid and kerosene. The Bolivian environmental group LIDEMA found that 30,000 tons of chemicals were disgarded into nearby rivers and streams in order to turn 127,000 tonnes of cocoa into the final project. But this was then exported to Columbia from the U.S., and the U.S. exported 59% of 6,000 metric tons of the chemicals needed to make cocaine.

The UN 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs is a contradiction in itself obviously allowing for U.S. interests as under Article #26:

– 2. The Parties shall so far as possible enforce the uprooting of all coca bushes which grow wild. They shall destroy the coca bushes if illegally cultivated.

Article #27

Art. 27. -1. The Parties may permit the use of coca leaves for the preparation of a flavoring agent, which shall not contain any alkaloids, and, to the extent necessary for such use, may permit the production, import, export, trade in and possession of such leaves.

– 2. The Parties shall furnish separately estimates (article 19) and statistical information (article 20) in respect of coca leaves for preparation of the flavoring agent, except to the extent that the same coca leaves are used for the extraction of alkaloids and the flavoring agent, and so explained in the estimates and statistical information.

By 1988, Bolivian passed controversial Law #1008, which aimed to control and eradicate the planting of cocoa using the army to raid illegal plantations. The use of chemicals in the form of pesticides to kill crops was forbidden in order to protect the environment, and to allow for gradual substitution of with cash crops like coffee, rice, maize, with future growth limiting future growth to 12,000 legal hectares. This program was funded by the U.S.

Morales called off the eradication program noting the resistance by Bolivians, and the cultural importance. Morales then built state-run factories for the legal production of cocoa products. Condemned by the U.S. which at the time of the impending global economic crisis was forcing countries around the world to take GM crops, the problem of cocoa leaf was to be addressed domestically.

By 2009, with the new constitution in the pipelines, the plant in its traditional use fell under protection.

January 31 2011, represented the deadline by which UN states could object to Bolivia’s proposal to amend the UN 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, which would remove cocoa leaf from the list.

While the enforced ban remains in place, the hypocritical practice of the Doctrine of Discovery is reflected in the U.S. State Department’s website which recommends drinking cocoa tea for altitude sickness, with the U.S. embassy in Le Paz serving its visitors with the tea. At the same time the UN maintains this ban, the UN Declaration of Indigenous People’s allows for the maintenance and upkeep of indigenous knowledge, traditions and expressions.

The lack of synchronicity between global laws serve to favor only one group, and that group has no allegiance to peoples, natural resources, and the natural laws that govern them beyond the allegiance to its self. As the growing non-acceptance of running the world in such a way increases at varying levels, surely the rightful balance of reciprocity will find its way!

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Quote…

Peace be upon you and peace be upon us.
May You be in peace and may we be in peace.
Peace be upon those who returned the greeting and even upon those who did not.
Peace, in the name of the lord of peace, the lord of mankind, the god of eternity.
Peace in which we prospered.
Peace mixed with the earth of this country.
Peace in which we no longer live.
Peace which no longer lives in us.
Peace we keep an eye on while it packs its bags.
To abandon our lands, little by little.
And it is replaced by surrender and submission to an islamisation in which there is no islam.
As if the islam of our grandparents no longer had anything to do with us.
Do you know why peace is abandoning us?
Do you know why darkness is all around us?
To put it simply, because we are a society that fears.
We are a society afraid of difference.
My words will not please some of you, or most of you, or all of you - i know.
But i will say them because i refuse to be one of the herd.
We are a society which refuses to admit that it is a society that lives in ignorance.
We are a society that shots with all audacity and pretends that it carries a different message.
We are a society that loves to claim superiority without having a valid reason.
And pretends that it is an educated society. It is sickening!
Among us, the acceptance of difference is nothing but a cover.
The difference in colour does us harm.
The difference in shape does us harm.
The difference in thinking does us harm.
The difference in religion does us harm.
Even the difference in gender does us harm.
That is why we try to kill any difference in our midst.
We have turned into a lethal poison for each other.
We are a society more stupid than stupidity itself.
Yes, we are a society more stupid that stupidity itself.
We fight over silly things, over delusions, over superstitions
While always refusing to look into the root of the problem.
And none of us is innocent of that. No!
No citizens nor politicians.
No those who find comfort in silence.
Nor those who pretend to be saints.
Nor those who follow the west blindly.
Nor those who pretend to go back to the glory of the caliphate and the slave markets.
And to the amputation of the limbs of those who differ.
Today, let us try to look inside ourselves
Inside the depth of our souls.
Let us try to embrace our souls.
Let us try to embrace our differences with our souls.
Here i am, before you, with my colour, with my hair, with my poetry, with my peculiarities, with my ideas.
I am not afraid of you.
I don’t fear that you’re different from me because i am part of you and you are part of me.
Let us create art. Let us grasp the dream.
So we can erect a culture without stupidity,
So our sophistication becomes the best of caliphates.
Let us melt away the traditions, the classes, the types, the ideas, the colours and the religions.
So we see nothing except the human being.

Dance of the Heart

Rejuvenate your Life with Aloe Vera

The pain you create now is always some form of non acceptance, some form of unconscious resistance to what is.

On the level of thought, the resistance is some form of judgement.

On the emotional level, it is some form of negativity.

The intensity of the pain depends on the degree of resistance to the present moment , and this in turn depends on how strongly you are identified with your mind.

The mind always seeks to deny the Now and to escape from it.

In other words, the more you are identified with your mind, the more you suffer.
Or you may put it like this the more you are able to honour and accept the Now,the more you are free of pain, of suffering and free of egoic mind.

Why does the mind habitually deny or resist the NOW?

Because it cannot function and remain in control without time,which is past and future,so it perceives the timeless Now as threatening.

Time and mind are infact inseparable .

Sunday Wire

Reader’s Reflections…

From Robert on San Francisco Judges Dismiss 66,000 Arrest Warrants against the Homeless*

Living on the streets cuts an average of 25 years from a person's life and degrades the quality of life for everyone. Another feature of the homeless population in San Francisco is that many of these people are simply too ill to care for themselves. We're almost half a century into the failure of the social experiment that closed the State Hospitals and no closer to ending the experiment now than when our media first noticed the experiment had failed in the 1980's.

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From Chatty on One Corrupt President Ousted*
What do you know, a democratic breath of fresh air SOMEWHERE in the world...amazing. I'm glad the people's voices were heard and the police did their jobs. Fantastic, and I hope South Korea can heal from this and get good leadership.

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From Joann on One Corrupt President Ousted*

Such a sorry business, sorry for the South Korean people, and sorry for former President Park Geun-hye (so foolish and weak). But I am very glad truth was revealed, and we may hope for fair punishment, and perhaps rehabilitation, involving prison time. This needs to become a world-wide trend.

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From Necltr on World Bank Declares itself Above the Law*
World Bank, World Loan Shark, to use selected politicians and troops to take over every nation and all of humanity

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From TheChattyIntrovert on India’s Cashless Villages not Really There Yet, But the Nightmare Has Begun*

I'm too paranoid to believe in a cashless society myself--too much identity theft here in the states, and too damned easy when everything's done electronically.

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From Mark on Jury Refuses to Convict Activist for Shutting Down Pipeline*

This is why the ruling elite have nearly eliminated jury trials.
If you didn’t know that your democratic rights to trials by jury had been eliminated for everything but felony charges, see http://americanjurypower.org/home/no_right.php and don’t miss the supreme court case at the link in that article in which 5 so-called conservative, strict constructionist justices found an invisible word in 2 clauses in that quaint old constitution in the ruling elite’s latest effort to convert a justice system designed to be controlled by the people into one controlled by the ruling elite.

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From N on Scientists Find Fluoride Causes Hypothyroidism Leading To Depression, Weight Gain, and Worse…*
For ambitious global tyrants, fluoridation is part of a win-win-win-... program; for at least 6.5 billion people it is lose-lose-lose... Lose mental capacity of ourselves and children, lose length of life, lose, free will ... For the Globalists, win a servile, depopulated humanity with no ability to know what is happening to them, let alone a capacity to solve their problems.

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From M… on New Report Exposes Rockefeller Dynasty’s Role in “Climate” Scam*
John D., Sr. had a brother, William Avery, with whom he founded Standard Oil and worked until William's death. The families still work cooperatively, like the Rothschilds, but in a smaller way. When you think of petroleum and banking in this country, think Rockefeller. Their man Nixon took us off the gold standard and prevented the silver certificate, replacing precious metals with the petrodollar. Think of global power possibilities with a monopoly of that liquid black gold, especially when accompanied with the fiction of supply limitation held for many decades.

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From Neben on The Taino of the Caribbean: the People Who Do Not Exist

I am Taino and Caiqueto, living in Georgia. We must unite here in the continental U.S.

My family are indigenous to "Hispaniola", "Puerto Rico", Aruba and Curacao. I have family members in Florida, New York, and other states.

We do and have always existed. These settlers and colonists need to be told our lives matter.

Even if our African brothers and sisters were brought here, or even travelled here on their own (many did), they became us. Not we became them. When you immigrate you assume the tribal identities and customs of the host nation. These colonialists know this so they lie and say our people no longer exist, and/or say that only mixed people and descendants of black slaves exist in the Caribbean. These are all lies. They have brainwashed people into voiding our birthright and inheritance!!!!

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From Chief Pedro Guanikeyu Torres on The Taino of the Caribbean: the People Who Do Not Exist

I find this blog article most interesting and it made me smile at the same time to see an old letter that my tribal council and I had published in Puerto Rico some 46 years ago and addressed to the Puerto Rican people as it make me feel really old today at 65 year of age today. Respectfully yours, Chief Pedro Guanikeyu Torres, Jatibonicu Taino People of Boriken (Puerto Rico) Tribal Government of the Jatibonicu Taino People of Puerto Rico

Moral Tales

“To be in ‘Islam’ is to be in that state of willingness to surrender, to let go of anything. It is the beginning of the awakening of intelligence . If you’re willing to let go of everything, whatever anxieties, fears, expectations , or desires you have, then your energy is available. Your intelligence sharper. Your actions more successful because you can see whether they relate or not.” – Sheikh Fadhlalla Haeri

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Community Notice Board

The topocentric New Moon Conjunction for the lunar month of Sha'aban will occur on Wednesday, the 26th of March 2017, at 22:32 AEST (10:32pm Sydney time).

The correct date to observe the crescent of Sha'aban is upon sunset of Thursday, the 27th of April 2017.

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The Radical Middle Way
{Surely they who divided their religion into parts and became sects, you have no concern with them; their affair is only with Allah, then He will inform them of what they did” – An.Anam 6:159).